


a thousand possible worlds (and not one of them with you)

by onetiredboy



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast), The Adventure Zone: Amnesty - Fandom
Genre: Amnesty, Angst, Other, Some comfort, and pining for one (1) cryptid, duck is awkward, indrid is soft, soft angst, this is just me projecting i guess, why am i in love with the mothman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-29
Updated: 2019-07-29
Packaged: 2020-07-25 11:40:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20025211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onetiredboy/pseuds/onetiredboy
Summary: Duck's been alone a long, long time now, and it's been a while since someone's taken his breath away from him. It's a little bit weird that the person who does, eventually, is actually THE Mothman, but hey -- if you're desperate, you'll take what you can get.





	a thousand possible worlds (and not one of them with you)

**Author's Note:**

> This is set pre-episode 30! Just before episode 19.

It’s a quiet night in the Monongahela forest. Somewhere, distantly, a chorus of frogs celebrates the rain that fell a few hours before. The atmosphere is thick with the aftertaste of rain.

Duck waves his flashlight lazily through the foliage, and then looks to the stars above. They’re beautiful here in Kepler, thanks to the lack of city pollution. But then, Duck will always be a country boy at heart.

“You don’t have to leave, you know,” he says.

There’s a slurping sound, and Duck looks back down with a half-smile and smart-arse remark building up behind his teeth, but it dies quickly in his mouth.

Indrid puts his mug of eggnog down on the steps of his RV, between his knees. The door behind them is open, blasting their backs with uncomfortable heat, but he’s still got a frankly ridiculous cloak drawn around his thin shoulders. It has a fur neck to it. The effect isn’t entirely unlike moth wings.

Indrid turns to him, the light bouncing off the red discs of his sunglasses, “I already know what you’re trying to say,” he admits, a little guiltily.

“Right,” says Duck, trying not to let his heart jump to his throat. He buries it down quickly. “That makes it easier, I guess.”

Indrid doesn’t respond. He picks up his mug again and swirls it for a moment, then drinks again. Duck watches the sharp lump of his Adam’s apple bob in his skinny throat.

The silence is making Duck’s anxiety worse, and fast. He clears his throat.

“If you really know what I’m asking, I could probably do with an answer,” he rushes it out all at once, only realising halfway through that Indrid is copying him in perfect sync.

Indrid turns towards Duck again. “It’s not a good power, Duck,” he says. “Knowing what people are going to say, what they’re going to do, what they’re going to think.”

Duck laughs, grinning, “You ask me, sounds like the kind of power that’d make you pretty good at dating.”

Duck can feel Indrid’s stare even through the glasses. “Not if you already know exactly how you’re going to break someone’s heart,” he says.

Duck’s grin freezes on his face. It dies a slow and painful death. Indrid stares at him, his pearl-coloured eyebrows drawing close in concern behind the red sunglasses.

“Right,” Duck says, looking down at his own knees. A moment passes, of silence. Then Indrid’s hand brushes over his knee.

“I’m sorry, Duck.”

Duck says nothing for a moment. Then he clears his throat fast. “Guess that’s just, uh…” he laughs weakly, “Just my luck, really.”

“Duck—”

“Naw, don’t worry about it. Probably for the best, really, you bein’ a-a… the mothman and all.”

“Well, there is that.”

“Be one hell of a story to tell though, huh?” Duck turns back at him and tries to grin, “Dating a cryptid.”

“I suppose so, if anyone would believe you.”

“Mmgh,” Duck looks straight ahead again, into the forest. He supposes it’s not the meanest rejection he’s had, even if it feels like he’s been dumped before he was even given a chance. He bites his lip, then tries to form a question, “Does it ever—”

“No,” Indrid says, “Not in a single universe.”

“Oh.”

Silence falls between them. Distantly, the frogs continue their chorus. Rain drips off of leaves and onto the wide brim of Duck’s forest ranger hat. The forest is a lonely place. It might be why Duck has always felt so connected to it.

Indrid finishes off his eggnog and then clears his throat loudly as he stands. It’s his cue to go. Duck stands up as well, groaning in a very un-Chosen-One-like way as he heaves himself to his feet.

“Well, um. Indrid…”

Indrid looks at him. His expression is so hard to read with the sunglasses obscuring his face, so it’s possible the pity Duck sees is just his imagination. He probably knows what he’s going to say already – probably knows everything he doesn’t say, as well.

“Thanks,” Duck says lamely. “For… helping us out these last few weeks.”

Indrid smiles softly. He puts his hand on Duck’s shoulder, pats him solidly. He wavers for a moment on the steps, deliberating, and then he leans forward and kisses Duck’s cheek.

“It’s not for lack of want, Duck,” he says softly. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

Another smile, another squeeze of the shoulder. Indrid steps into his RV and turns around to face Duck.

“Duck,” he says, his voice the most serious Duck has ever heard it. He leans out of the door as if making sure his message comes across with enough emphasis. “One day,” he says, “You _will _be happy. I know that much.” He pauses, then adds, “There’s an umbrella in the back of your car that you’ve forgotten is there.”

Then the RV door closes.

Duck stands on the steps, in the rapidly cooling air, and begins to feel the rain start up again, falling in fat drops against his ranger uniform. It’s not his first rejection but, standing out here in the cold and the wet, it’s probably the most poetically pleasing one.

“At least you’re a good liar,” he mutters to the closed door.

Duck turns, and begins trudging up a beaten down trail in the forest towards his car.

The next day, Indrid Cold is chained up on the ground, beaten and bruised. And Duck slices through the chain holding him, punches him in the face, gives him his escape.

“Goodbye! I’m free!” Indrid calls, joyous, from high overhead, and Duck only has a second to smile, and – for a fleeting moment – to ache, before he has to return to the fight.

And like that, Indrid is gone. 


End file.
